posted at 8:31 pm on June 10, 2012 by Allahpundit

The supporter survey comes on the heels of a difficult month for the president, which saw Obama’s team on the defensive over a still weak economy, a set-back for Democrats and labor groups in Wisconsin’s recall election, a strong fundraising month for rival Romney and increasing congressional anger over a series of national security leaks.

***

When Jared Bernstein, Vice President Biden’s former top economist, began reviewing notes of President Obama’s press conference on Friday, he stopped cold when he read “the private sector is doing fine.”

“It caught my eye,” Bernstein told National Journal. Bernstein immediately fired off an email to the intern who took the notes to make sure it was accurate and not a rough or garbled translation. “I thought, ‘Did he really say that?'”

To his dismay, the intern wrote back that those were Obama’s words. Verbatim…

[T]he health of the private sector can’t be measured solely or even primarily by job creation. Most people, after all, haven’t gone through the horror of unemployment.

What they have gone through is a period in which they have almost no job mobility, and a period in which their wages haven’t grown much — even as the inflated cost of gas and food has eaten away at what little gain they have enjoyed.

And that doesn’t even get into the discomfiting anxieties that come with working in America in 2012 — the sense that many jobs are tenuous, that maybe your employer can get by with one worker instead of two and that the one who gets laid off will be you.

***

There’s a deeper issue here than just Obama being thoughtlessly glib about the slow-growth nature of the U.S. economic recovery…

The remark reveals the government-centered nature of Obama’s thinking. He just doesn’t give private enterprise very much thought, particularly when it comes to all the ways government can muck up the free enterprise system. To Obama, the private sector is always “doing fine,” so it really doesn’t matter if the public sector overloads it with too many taxes and too much regulation. The private sector? Oh, you means guys like Bain Capital who like to fire people.

No wonder there’s been so little sense of urgency by the Obama White House to cut the sky-high corporate tax rate or so little consideration given to the impact on small business of letting the Bush tax cuts expire. The private sector is “doing fine,” after all. Unintended consequences? What are those?

***

Even Obama has made noises about cutting the size of the government bureaucracy — the foundation, at the federal level, of Washington’s disconnected high life. Does he not mean it? If that’s supposed to happen, when? It clearly can’t happen when the country’s in recession, according to the president–which is why his original 2009 stimulus bill sought to preserve state and local government jobs. Now he’s telling us it can’t happen when the economy is recovering and the private sector is doing fine growing at a modest pace. Is he really going to want to cut unneeded government jobs later, when the private sector really is “doing fine” and there’s lots of tax revenue to fund the fat-marbled government payroll? Why would he do that, if he sees government jobs as jobs, a good thing, the equivalent to private jobs. That he doesn’t say when he’d cut the jobs only reinforces the suspicion that he doesn’t want to cut them at all, ever.

Anyway, the bigger problem with Obama’s press conference was that there wasn’t any news in Obama’s prepared remarks. This really makes me shake my head. If you’re going to call a press conference, you have to give beat reporters something new. New is the root of news. If you don’t say something new, a misstatement is bound to dominate, or an answer to an off-message question…

At bottom, then, the press conference reflected the general drift that Clift described. The White House doesn’t have an argument right now. Ever since the jobs report, Romney’s got all the momentum. The White House has tried but then dropped arguments, as I wrote earlier this week, and it sounds a little whiny and ineffectual when Obama urges Congress to pass something that everybody knows Congress isn’t going to pass. And by the way, he ought at least to say “Republicans,” not “Congress.” I’m sure there are risks associated with sounding too partisan, but to me, he has little choice but to lump Romney and the GOP Congress together.

***

A series of liberal favorites, culminating with former Obama environmental adviser Van Jones, took to the stage at the Rhode Island Convention Center to rally the Democratic base — and also to make clear that nearly four years after his election, Obama has not lived up to their expectations…

“We went from having a crush to feeling crushed,” he added, as the convention hall — which at about 1,500 activists was about half-full compared with where it stood during Warren’s address on Friday — responded with cheers and applause…

“We have a quandary,” Jones said Saturday night. “We know we’re supposed to be fired up, and we know we’re supposed to be ready to go. But we’re pissed off! We’re mad. And we have reason to be. … Somebody said, ‘I feel like I’m caught between Barack and a hard place.’”

“I want to be happy with him,” said Democrat Kristine Vaughan, a 45-year-old school psychologist from Canton, Ohio. “But I am finding that he has succumbed to the corporate influence as much as everyone else. I think he has so much potential to break out of that, but overall he has been a disappointment.”…

Most plan on voting for Obama and their gripes are not unlike what the White House has heard for much of the president’s term. But these left-leaning backers’ varying levels of enthusiasm could spell trouble for a president whose 2008 victory was fueled by a massive network of grass-roots volunteers and small-dollar donors. Polls show the president locked in a tight race that’s likely to be decided in several swing states where he scored narrow victories four years ago. Places like Ohio, Florida and Virginia are expected to be especially competitive, and Obama will need liberal supporters to both work on his behalf and turn out in droves on Election Day.

“He’s done a good job, but he could have done a lot better,” said Ed Tracey, 55, of Lebanon, N.H., who heads his local chapter of the group, Drinking Liberally.

***

“There’s no doubt that Obama has turned out to be a major enigma and disappointment,” [a liberal] historian told me. “He waged such a brilliant campaign, first against Hillary Clinton in the primaries, and then against John McCain in the general election. For a long time, I found it hard to understand why he couldn’t translate his political savvy into effective governance.

“But I think I know the answer now,” he continued. “Since the beginning of his administration, Obama hasn’t been able to capture the public’s imagination and inspire people to follow him. Vision isn’t enough in a president. Great presidents not only have to enunciate their vision; they must lead by example and inspiration. Franklin Roosevelt spoke to the individual. He and Ronald Reagan had the ability to make each American feel that the president cared deeply and personally about them.

“That quality has been lacking in Obama. People don’t feel that he’s on their side. Obama doesn’t connect. He doesn’t have the answers. The irony is that he was supposed to be such a brilliant orator. But, in fact, he’s turned out to be a failure as a communicator.”

***

“This was not a good week, though, for the president,” Schieffer said.

The surrogate, Maryland governor Martin O’Malley, a Democrat and the head of the Democratic Governors Association replied, “We’ve had better weeks. And [there’ll] be good weeks and bad weeks.”

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I have faith that he does not. However, it’s not an issue to be upset over. Certainly opting out of life is out of the question. We’ll die when we do, up to that point if you don’t try to live your life the best you can you’re a complete jackass. Hey, that covers most of the lefties doesn’t it…..

I have faith that he does not. However, it’s not an issue to be upset over. Certainly opting out of life is out of the question. We’ll die when we do, up to that point if you don’t try to live your life the best you can you’re a complete jackass. Hey, that covers most of the lefties doesn’t it…..

Wolfmoon on June 11, 2012 at 3:07 AM

What an interesting coincidence, I likewise have faith that the Flying Spaghetti Monster doesn’t love me either. The fact that he has never thrown any Meatballs of Wrath at me, not withstanding. Moreover I am absolutely certain that at least one of us has a 100 percent chance of being correct and a well founded faith.

A lot of people are afraid of Father Sky. That’s fine. Take that and all of the supernatural out of the equation, and what you’re left with is is the greatest prescription for happiness. Forgive those who have harmed you. Forgive yourself and move on. Love your enemies, turn your cheek. Here are dozens of parables of how to live a life of grace when others want to harm and ridicule you. Find grace, happiness follows. If theology isn’t your thing, look at Christianity as a philosophical proscription for mental and emotional well-being. It’s a symphony compared to the plinking on a toy piano of Freudian dwelling on victimhood and personal weakness.

I look forward to that day when my sinful nature departs me entirely and the new man that Jesus Christ promised me I would one day become, is no long a promise that I eagerly look forward to, but a reality that I experience.

SWalker on June 11, 2012 at 2:47 AM

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I hope you attain the state of grace you seek. When I grow impatient with some circumstance I remind myself everything happens in God’s good time.

It was a pleasure to read that this AM. I find that too many people nominally subscribe to such religious tenants and act as though they don’t apply to themselves. Whereas many who don’t practice any faith at all conduct themselves with the forms of conduct that you describe. In the end, I don’t think that religion makes people better or lack of faith makes us worse human beings. I think that good intentions, empathy, forgiveness (and their opposites) are independent of faith.

The most significant aspect of Obama’s “gaffe” goes beyond his incredibly clueless remark about the private sector “being fine.” It is that he views government as an equal contributor to the economy that must keep pace with private enterprise. He considers it a productive, wealth-creating part of our economy.

Government is overhead. It is essential that we have roads, education, infrastructure and the rest, but it is not where wealth comes from. It is the cost of doing business for our nation. The private sector, to the extent it is hanging on at all, is getting by these days by cutting overhead costs. Businesses are not growing, they are consolidating to stay afloat and compensate for the huge price of a massive and growing government burden.

If we are to emerge intact from the age of Obama, it will be by cutting costs of government and removing the burden of bloated regulations and taxes that are stifling the productive, wealth-generating private sector.

Stevie “The Rat” Rattner was the worst. Just shameless. He must being doing penance for being one of the Booker boys during the Bain Capital thing. Now he’s going to do his very own dog and pony magic numbers schtick. Hoo boy.

I get the strong sense that Mitt is feeling it. That he is gaining confidence with each day and his momentum is starting to really feed off of itself. The polls in all the swing states are moving his way and he even is doing well in places like CO, MI and MO. I think that Mitt’s train has left the station and there will be no stopping it!

I get the strong sense that Mitt is feeling it. That he is gaining confidence with each day and his momentum is starting to really feed off of itself. The polls in all the swing states are moving his way and he even is doing well in places like CO, MI and MO. I think that Mitt’s train has left the station and there will be no stopping it!

Who is the lady who keeps making sense this AM on MoJo. She’s just massacring the apologist mouth pieces. Like this clown who denies that the Left routinely depicted Bush as a NAZI and have given PBHO a pass for extending the same policies.

It was a pleasure to read that this AM. I find that too many people nominally subscribe to such religious tenants and act as though they don’t apply to themselves. Whereas many who don’t practice any faith at all conduct themselves with the forms of conduct that you describe. In the end, I don’t think that religion makes people better or lack of faith makes us worse human beings. I think that good intentions, empathy, forgiveness (and their opposites) are independent of faith.

Who is the lady who keeps making sense this AM on MoJo. She’s just massacring the apologist mouth pieces. Like this clown who denies that the Left routinely depicted Bush as a NAZI and have given PBHO a pass for extending the same policies.

I’m sure there are risks associated with sounding too partisan, but to me, he has little choice but to lump Romney and the GOP Congress together.

And there is the rub. Romney hasn’t been part of the 112th Congress or any Congress for that matter. Obama can whine all he wants that the Congress isn’t rubber stamping his super-smart ideas or something but the fact of the matter is that Obama can not complain that Romney is holding up his “jobs bill” which is nothing more than another round of stimulus spending to keep public sector employees from being laid off. Everybody knows it is a stimulus bill that will do nothing but appease the unions. Everybody knows that it has no chance of ever becoming law. It’s all political theater for public sector unions.

Because we learned from Obama on Friday that the private sector is doing just fine and we need to spend money on public sector employees to make it even better for those in the private sector! I don’t think any of Obama’s minions did well this weekend explaining this little bit of stupidity. Mark my words, Friday was Obama’s Michael Dukakis moment.

I would like to bring your (sic) attention to a poster who uses the handle, “kingsjester.” In my opinion, he has routinely violated your terms of use by continually harassing me. He has followed me around your forums for over a year, that’s right a YEAR, now to interject personal attacks, insults, misrepresentations and the like. His usual routine is to take some post out of context of mine from years back and providing some made up and self-serving spin to it. I’ve done my best to ignore him and to placate him. I’ve responded with civility on the occasions when I have responded at all.

“We have a quandary,” Jones said Saturday night. “We know we’re supposed to be fired up, and we know we’re supposed to be ready to go. But we’re pissed off! We’re mad. And we have reason to be. … Somebody said, ‘I feel like I’m caught between Barack and a hard place.’”

You ain’t felt nothing – yet – you little communist punk!

On a personal note, I’d like to share something that happened yesterday that made me feel there is still real hope for America.

Mr. Duh was wearing a hat that identifies him as a Vietnam Vet at the grocery store. A young man who appeared to be in his mid-20’s came up to him, pointed to the hat and said, “were you really over there?” Not being sure of what to expect, Mr. Duh stiffened his back and said, “yes, I did 26 months over there.”

The young man then extended his hand and said, “I want to thank you for your service sir.” Mr. Duh shook his hand and walked away, brushing a tear from his eye, remembering the time he was spat upon in the airport when returning home from his first tour.

The young man then extended his hand and said, “I want to thank you for your service sir.” Mr. Duh shook his hand and walked away, brushing a tear from his eye, remembering the time he was spat upon in the airport when returning home from his first tour.

First went the mood. Next, the muscle failed. Finally, to close out a horrific week for President Obama’s reelection bid, went the message.

The first week of June began with a monthly jobs report that solidified a sense of an anemic economic recovery. Then a Democratic loss in Wisconsin, coupled with staggering Romney campaign fundraising figures, revealed the strength of political organization on the right.

The week was punctuated by the most prominent voice in the party short of the president himself undercutting key Obama campaign messaging. To round out the rough patch, the president tried to turn the story lines around, but wound up delivering the kind of line that’s tailor-made for his opponents to make famous.

“The private sector is doing fine,” President Obama said Friday, at a press conference organized because it most certainly isn’t, at least in the minds of most Americans.

i can see why america has such a dearth of originality, everywhere, the movies can’t seem to do anything but sequels, and it’s obvious the idiot left gets told what to say and they just parrot it to death. chanted rhyming slogans are the result of a populous that is really stupid. it is very easy to get the people to accept slave chains when they are uneducated. it’s laughable when someone brings up the anti-religious “flying spaghetti monster” meme or “a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle” because these ideas are from the realm of the gullible. obtuse, puerile and witless come to mind when i think about and watch the democrat party try to get america to accept idiot socialism , or even soccer for that matter.

I’m not a Palin hater, but I’m also not one that would vote for her in a primary. In that context I have to hand it to her in that video she had some nice, concise explanations of conservative fundamentals.

The young man then extended his hand and said, “I want to thank you for your service sir.” Mr. Duh shook his hand and walked away, brushing a tear from his eye, remembering the time he was spat upon in the airport when returning home from his first tour.

Flora Duh on June 11, 2012 at 7:38 AM

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Please pass along my thanks for his service – and thank you for sharing this story.